


like the quickening hues

by ygrittebardots



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-22
Updated: 2015-02-22
Packaged: 2018-03-14 13:15:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3411950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ygrittebardots/pseuds/ygrittebardots
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the aftermath of their mother's death, Beru and Anakin are unsure how to come to terms with each other after ten years apart.</p><p>  <i>Or, that AU where Beru is Anakin's sister.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	like the quickening hues

**Author's Note:**

> (because Shmi and Cliegg's marriage was super skeevy and Beru seemed way more fond of Anakin anyway)

Anakin remembers being nine. He remembers it like grit and salt and the sting of a purple bruise under his eye, and the warmth of his mother and sister’s arms. Beru remembers being fifteen. She remembers it like a door, with burning suns and tired limbs on one side and the laughter and flimsy facade of safety and  _home_  on the other. Beru remembers being fifteen and watching her little brother, the one half of her world, walk away from her and into the unknown.

At nineteen and twenty-five, Anakin and Beru are learning to fit people back into their lives they’d thought were gone for good. Beru skirts around Owen’s farm with an uncharacteristic quiet, nearly sending a fresh bottle of blue milk flying when that girl - Padmé, her name is Padmé - brushes against her arm. Anakin says little, too, and keeps himself to corners with faulty datapads, broken scanners, japor snippets and boneblades to keep his attention. Always something to do, something to fix, just something to be in his hands.

They are both angry, both lost. They mourn their mother.

His big sister was always tough, scary even. That was one of those things about growing up. She’s the one who sent would-be assailants on their way with broken hands and bruised jaws, the one who pretended not to be hungry when food was scarce, the one who more than once stepped between him and Watto’s fist. So try as he might not to let it show, Anakin can’t help the anger that rises in him, the fury that she, who always protected him, could not protect their mother.

Beru sees the accusation in her little brother’s eyes and wants to yell. She wants to kick and scream and bite and shout at him,  _You’re not a child anymore. You don’t get to blame me. You weren’t here. You left._

Anakin left, and she stayed.

Anakin left, and she learned to pick pockets. To find and salvage and sell. To get men to give her credits for trinkets she never bought. To play sabacc. To bet on races. To win.

She and Mom went through hell and back to earn a new life for themselves, to learn what it is to live without fear or shame. And Anakin left.

In her heart, Beru knows she’s being unfair. Because Anakin  _was_  a child when they sent him off into the unknown world. At fifteen, Beru had known just as well as her mother that they had nothing to go on, nothing to trust but the word of an old man who said he was a Jedi, and that in the moment, that had to be enough. They couldn’t have known what they were sending him to. He couldn’t have known he would never be allowed back. It was nothing but a thin and fragile hope.

Knowing what she does now, Beru’s not sure she would support Mom’s decision twice. But that is not Anakin’s fault.

He finds her outside, shivering despite the midmorning heat, staring at the fresh mound where they gave their mother back to the desert. He _is_ angry. Hurt. Lost. But for just a moment Anakin remembers being nine years old again, and leans into her, and even though she is a full head shorter than him now, her solid warmth and arm across his back can be enough for now to calm the rage inside of him. And though she knows he’ll soon be gone, this time for who knows how long, for just a moment she can be fifteen again, with a solid door between her tired bones and the love in her heart for this boy who is her brother.

Standing before their mother’s grave, though neither of them know it yet, Beru and Anakin Skywalker are a family for the last time.


End file.
